New blood test ‘detects 93% of 18 different cancers in the earliest stages’
A NEW blood test can spot 18 different cancers in their earliest stages, a study shows.
US researchers said the tool could spot a wide variety of tumours when they are most easy to treat, which is “not currently achievable with existing tests or techniques”.
Biotech firm Novelna researchers said it has a “sensitivity much greater” than the Galleri test currently being trialled in the NHS.
The “new generation” tech detected 93 per cent of stage one cases in men and 84 per cent in women.
Dr Bogdan Budnik, of Harvard University, said: “Our protein-based plasma test is a strong candidate for use as a population-wide screening tool.
“It has shown high sensitivity in detecting a variety of early stage tumours in asymptomatic patients.”
Around 3million Brits are currently living with cancer, with experts predicting numbers could rise to more than 5.3million by 2040.
The disease is much easier to treat in its early stages before symptoms appear, but most tests are specific to the type of tumour a patient has, which can slow down diagnosis.
The NHS is currently trialling a blood test made by Californian company Grail that can detect 50 cancers before signs of disease start to show.
The new Novelna test “outperforms existing technologies, providing a more efficient approach for early cancer detection”, researchers claimed.
It works by looking at proteins in blood plasma, which can differentiate cancer samples from normal ones.
The test also takes into account your gender, with some cancers more likely to affect you at different ages depending on if you’re a man or a woman.
A study, published in BMJ Oncology, tested how well the tool spotted cancer in 440 people who had been previously diagnosed and 44 healthy blood donors.
The patients who had previously been diagnosed had cancers affecting all the major organs of the human body.
The test identified proteins which showed early-stage cancers “with great accuracy” and where they originated in the body in 80 per cent of cases.
Independent experts said the trials “show some promise” for the test, but more research is needed.
Dr Mangesh Thorat, of Queen Mary University of London, said: “The interesting aspects of this assay are a much higher sensitivity for stage I cancers than other similar assays in development.”
Professor Stephen Duffy, of Queen Mary University of London, said: “The results suggest good sensitivity, including to early stage cancers, and low false positive rates.
“Identification of the site of tumour origin was less accurate, but nevertheless impressive.”